Irvine Butterfield – Perthshire based writer, photographer and mountain enthusiast – was today granted the John Muir Trust’s Lifetime Achievement Award at the Dundee Mountain Festival. Irvine has dedicated his life to the conservation of wild land and has authored many books on our High Mountains. The most recent, The Magic of Munros, was published in 2005. Irvine is only the fourth person to be granted a Lifetime Achievement Award in the 26 years of the Trust’s life. Irvine Butterfield’s enthusiasm for mountain country and wild land in Scotland dates back to the inception of the John Muir Trust in…

The short days and long dark nights may be a winter curse to many hill walkers but a Scottish project is seeking to get people to use this time to appreciate the stars and report the best places to view them. Astronomers from the Dark Sky Scotland programme are working with the John Muir Trust and Forestry Commission Scotland to help communities and outdoor learning providers find local Dark Sky Discovery sites as part of the build up to International Year of Astronomy 2009. Every community in Scotland, even in the towns and cities, has a local open space that…

Last week brought the first sustained cold snap in the Highlands, bringing snow to most mountain summits and icy conditions in many places. For skilled mountaineers this is the season when the Scottish Hills can bring their greatest rewards, but it is also a time when the hills are full of danger for the unsuspecting. Every year there are many accidents which could have been avoided to hillwalkers who couldn’t cope with the conditions. Remember – there is no such thing as winter hillwalking – it’s mountaineering. In winter every hillwalker heading for summits above the snow line needs to…

Archaeologists working on St Kilda, the National Trust for Scotland’s dual World Heritage Site have discovered a cross-inscribed slab that had previously gone un-noticed on the island, thanks to the sun. Staff from the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS) recently visited the island as part of a special project to investigate and record the rich variety of archaeological evidence that exist on St Kilda. They discovered the cross on a piece of stone that had been reused as the cover slab of a drain. It had never been spotted before, despite being located in…

This year’s golden spurtle, the Oscar’s of the porridge world, has been awarded to Ian Bishop who runs the Slochd Mhor bunkhouse, skiing centre and bike shop, near Carrbridge in the Cairngorms. Ian, who has now been crowned World Porridge Making Champion, has entered every year for the last fifteen years, and is one of only a handful of local winners. Ian put his success down to perserverance and local water taken from a bore hole near his house. “I remember the first year when it was organised and I had never made porridge before,” he said. “I saw the…

The John Muir Trust announced today that it is accepting entries for the 2009 Wild Writing Competition at the Fort William Mountain Festival. The competition, which is free and open to all, encourages both aspiring and professional writers to pen stories about Scotland’s landscapes and wild places. “We are looking for inspiring short stories with the broad theme of’ ‘experiences in wild places,’” commented competition organizer Alison Austin. “Your entry can be factual or fictional and could incorporate a journey, a place, an expedition, a mountain or river, a walk, climb, sail or kayak.” First Prize is a place on…

Tayside Police have resumed searching for a woman missing on Schiehallion in Perthshire since Sunday. The woman, who is in her 70s, had been walking with her son when they became separated, and she was reported missing. It is understood that she was not equipped to spend a night out. Rescue teams from RAF Leuchars and Lossiemouth are involved in the search.

Walkhighlands often receives requests asking us about or offering opinions on the use of GPS devices as a navigation aid, so we’ve put together a series of brief articles covering the most basic points. This article Using a GPS outlines our basic tips on some of the ways in which you can use a GPS to help with your navigation when out in the hills.

The public is being consulted about plans to extend the Cairngorms National Park into Perth and Kinross to include the area around Calvine, Blair Atholl and the Spittal of Glenshee. It excludes Struan and Killecrankie. The twelve-week consultation gives people the chance to tell the Scottish Government where they think the new boundary should be and also how many people from each local authority should sit on the Park Authority after the boundary changes. The consultation is being run by Scottish Natural Heritage and further details can be found here

The number of midges in the north and west Scotland has been falling recently. At the same time midge numbers in Northern Ireland and parts of South West England and Wales have been increasing. However a midge expert said that this was likely to be due to local weather conditions each year rather than a general shift of the insects south as a result of climate change. The BBC reported that Dr Alison Blackwell, from Edinburgh University, said that midge levels down south and in Northern Ireland were unlikely to reach the levels found in parts of Scotland. “Midges need…